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Oxford Student Published for Obesity Research
High School Senior Links Obesity and Risk Factors
Oxford, Mississippi (September 18, 2019) — Edward Hu a senior at Oxford High School has been published by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) for his three-year research about obesity in teens and obesity risk factors.
“I know how important public health is, and living in Mississippi has really increased my awareness in poor public health standards in my state and the local community,” says Edward Hu, author of Obesity Among High School Students in the United States: Risk Factors and Their Population Attribute Fraction. “In an attempt to help solve some of these problems, I decided to investigate obesity and its causes. I was eventually able to use methods to find the proportion of obesity that could be prevented with the removal of a specific risk factor.”
Hu worked along with Sujith Ramachandran, a Ph.D. student at the University of Mississippi, Kaustuv Bhattacharya and Sasikiran Nunna, both professors at the University of Mississippi. Their research found that a greater proportion of high school students engaged in unhealthy dietary, physical activity, or other lifestyle behaviors. About 24.7 percent of students watched television for three hours or more per day on an average school day; 42.4 percent did not play on any sports team during the past school year; 18.5 percent currently used cigarettes, cigar, or smokeless tobacco; and 72.7 percent slept eight hours or less on an average school night.
“It’s very rare that a high school student has published research, much less research that is published by the CDC,” says Heather Lenard, Oxford School District’s Public Information Officier. “Hu is a remarkable student who will go on and do remarkable things.”
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This news story is written by Payton Hasik, Communications Intern from the University of Mississippi.